Investigators ruled a baby girl's death an accident. Then her sister got hurt.

Gwynne Hess died when she was 22 months old. Her death was initially ruled an accident, but after her older sister Gracie got hurt, investigators re-examined Gwynne's death.(Photo: Ken Ruinard / staff)

"They were always playing together, two peas in a pod," Hammond said. "Gracie wanted to help Gwynne. If Gwynne needed to be changed, Gracie would hand me a diaper. She would stick close to her. Usually, if you would see one of them, the other one was somewhere nearby. I called them Gracie Bug and Gwynnie Bee. If I called out 'Hey Buggy Bee,' they'd both come running. They were in it together.

"Once, Gwynne was fussy and Gracie started feeding her," Hammond said. "I turned around and saw it and was able to get a picture of them. It was precious. I didn't know how precious it would turn out to be."

That was a simpler time. Before everything changed. Before Gracie was hurt. Before Gwynne was gone.

For the first time, in an interview with the Independent Mail, their mother talked about the day her family unraveled. And her efforts to get justice for a little girl lost.

'No bruising, no nothing'

She said she remembers seeing the blinds move.

Ravyn Hammond said she thought the cat was playing, maybe jumping around inside. It was a June evening, and Hammond was outside her Westminster home spraying the windows, she said. Her daughters, Gracie and Gwynne, were in the house playing, and her boyfriend, Matthew Chappell, was watching them. Gracie was barely 3, and Gwynne was 22 months old.

Hammond said she was still outside working when Chappell told her she needed to come in the house.

She said that when she went inside the house, Gwynne wasn't breathing. Hammond said Chappell told her that the baby girl had choked on a gummy snack. Hammond looked in her daughter's mouth. She couldn't see anything.

She called 911. She tried performing compressions on Gwynne's tiny body.

"I was calm until she started turning blue," Hammond said. "And then I freaked out."

Paramedics resuscitated her, then rushed her to Greenville Memorial Hospital.

"She didn't have any signs of an injury on her head — no bruising, no nothing," Hammond said.

Over the course of several hours, doctors and nurses repeatedly tested Gwynne for brain activity, her mother said. They found none.

Gwynne died June 11, 2017. The Oconee County Coroner's Office ruled her death an accident, and her tiny organs were donated to save others' lives.

Another medical emergency

In the months after Gwynne's death, Hammond stayed involved with Chappell, whom she'd met through work in an Upstate manufacturing plant. Chappell is not the father of Gracie or Gwynne.

In November 2017, tragedy struck again.

This time, 3-year-old Gracie was rushed to Oconee Memorial Hospital.

Gwynne Hess is shown in a picture that her mother, Ravyn Hammond, is holding. Gwynne was 22 months old when she died in June 2017.(Photo: Nikie Mayo/Anderson Independent Mail)

She had multiple skull fractures, according to investigators with the Oconee County Sheriff's Office.

Chappell told deputies that he couldn't reach Hammond, who was at work. When someone told Hammond that Chappell said he couldn't reach her, she said she believed that at first.

"Sometimes, I didn't have great cellphone reception at work, so I figured that had to be what happened," she said. "But before long, I knew something wasn't right."

Deputies determined that Chappell had pushed Gracie, causing her injuries, according to an arrest warrant issued against him. She was pushed into a changing table, according to her mother.

What happened to Gracie caused investigators to re-examine Gwynne's death, which had previously been ruled an accident.

"Signing the papers to have her body exhumed was one of the hardest things I have ever done," Hammond said.

When Gwynne's body was examined, fractures were found in her skull. This time, Oconee County Coroner Karl Addis ruled her death a homicide.

In November 2017, Chappell was charged with child abuse against Gracie and homicide by child abuse in Gwynne's death. He is in the Oconee County Detention Center awaiting trial. David Wagner, the 10th Judicial Circuit Solicitor, said recently that he expects the case will go to court sometime between January and April.

Efforts to reach Chappell's attorney of record were unsuccessful.

Life now for a mom and one little girl

Hammond and her daughter Gracie are each seeing therapists, she said.

"There are still big blocks of time that I don't remember," Hammond said. "Things come back to me in bits and pieces — like seeing the blinds move that day. I don't think anymore that the cat caused them to move. I think they moved when Gwynne was being hurt."

A few weeks ago, Hammond's father, Jerry, started a Facebook page called "Justice For Gwynne." He said he believes the case involving his granddaughters has been unfinished for too long and that he is hoping the page will lead to the case being heard in court sooner rather than later.

Ravyn Hammond said she is supportive of that effort on Facebook but that she has learned to avoid other social media posts about the case.

"When there were charges brought in this case over a year ago, there were total strangers on Facebook talking about what a bad mother they thought I was," she said. "I wasn't prepared for that."

Hammond said there have been times that she thought and rethought about what happened, going over details of what her life once was and what it is now.

"I have had moments where I'm like, 'Why didn't I see this? Why didn't I know this?'" Hammond said in an interview this month. "But he never showed a temper around me. He was always nice to my girls, always patient. Or at least that's what I thought. I'm the mom who runs background checks on my girls' daycare. I don't leave them with just anyone. He seemed so good with them."

Gracie, who is now 4, holds up that many fingers to tell a stranger her age. Playing near her mom this month, Gracie talked about looking forward to Christmas and a visit from Santa. She eagerly pointed out Gwynne in pictures and talked about her as though she's not far away.

"Sissy's the small one," she said.

- Follow Nikie Mayo on Twitter @NikieMayo.

Where are they now? This is part of a series during the holidays in which The Greenville News and Anderson Independent Mail are taking time to update some of our most well-read stories of the past year, and some other stories that our readers regularly ask about.

An angel marks the grave of baby Gwynne Hess, which is in a cemetery near the First Baptist Church in Westminster.(Photo: Ken Ruinard / staff)